What time of day to take pred?

I have always taken Pred first thing in morning, not sure if I did right thing as it got to mid afternoon before I felt really pain free. I am now on Alternate days 1mg but not totally pain free . Good luck .

Hi I struggle with this myself.  If I take it in the morning, it takes 3 hours to be painfree.  I am a "morning person", and I like to "get going" fairly bright and early.  I do not want to be in pain.......

I prefer to take the whole amount actually in the evening, and I feel fine in the morning.  It does happen that by afternoon I have to reach for a couple of Tylenol because the effect of the prednisone has worn off.

Everybody is different....I cannot say that this is the right solution for others.

Sorry to sound cynical, but we are talking about an affliction whose cause is unknown, whose cure is unknown, and for which there are few lifestyle changes that help.  On top of that, just about all physicians treat it with the same drug.  Thus, the only way they can distinguish themselves, or appear to have something useful to say or do, is to vary the dose.  My rheumi, for example, believes that most sufferers are started on much to high a dose, and that after they taper to zero, the symptoms invariably return.  He starts at 15 mg at the most, tapers it by 0.5 mg per month until I reach 3 mg or 2 mg without the symptoms returning, and I then stay on that dose for ever.  That is his belief.  And he says to take the dose once a day, in the morning.

One thing I have learnt in the short term I have been a member of this forum is that as individuals we are all different when it comes to pmr, how it affects us and how we can best manage it to help in our daily lives. Many take it first thing in the morning as instructed, others take it much earlier, others split the dose. I personally find it helps me cope with my day if I take it around 4am as my working day starts around 8am. That may change as I lower the dose, I do not know. I'd say if your current way is working for you.. stick with it, if not experiment a little depending on how you want things to change for you.

I used to take mine at 5am ish, with fruit & yogurt. then i would go back to bed for a hour or two. unlike karen i am retired so did not have any set time to arise again. that worked fine for me. best wishes to one & all.

i have always taken mine   around  11.30  am. and was ok untill i got  down to 4mg

and then i had  a little pain as i got out of bed,   and took  and took my morning  dose again. i must add the pain was  bearable.   but as i got  down to 3mg i would take 1  paracetamol.  as i  got out of bed.  but then down to 2   i  started with a flare  so went  back to  5 mg   where i have  now been for   2 month

I too am struggling on my alternate days as Rhuemy suggested, the ideal totally pain free dose for me is 2.5 daily but have managed for a few weeks on 1mg Pred.However the tops of legs muscles are very very stiff when getting out of chair and painful so going for blood test to see if my Esr is past 12 and then I will know its a flare.In meantime back to a daily dose.When will we be free I wonder, I am now 30 months with Pmr.

I'm new to taking it. My Rheumatologist told me to take 5 mgs 3 times a day unless it gave me insomnia, which it has. So I did my own thing and take 10 mgs in the morning. I'm hoping I can keep it at 10 mgs and nott go up to 15. He said as long as that helped it was fine.

The accepted best practice for taking corticosteroids for PMR and GCA is in a single dose as early as possiblle in the morning. One study has shown that the optimum time to take plain white tablets to avoid morning stiffness is 2am - not entirely practical but I know people who do it.

Remember, Medrol is used for a lot of different things and the normal practice in other illnesses may be to take it in 3 doses spread over the day to achieve and even anti-inflammatory action. In PMR, as in RA, the inflammatory substances are shed in the body in the early morning, about 4.30am (hence the 2am best time) so the greatest amount of work to be done is in the morning. The later you take the steroid the more the inflammation has developed.

There are people for whom the effect doesn't last all day - in some cases they do better by taking about 2/3 of the dose in the morning and the rest in the evening. But as you see from the other posts various people do various things depending on their needs. We on the support groups often tell people to take it as early as they can and settle down for another couple of hours - by which time the pred will be working and you can "get going" as normal.

Hi there,

Iam new to PMR however even before seeing the Rumi I knew I needed to split the dose. It just wasn't pulling me through the day. Once I saw her and she told me to split morning/ lunch I was delighted and it made a world of difference for me. My mornings became wonderful however I would get some retuning aches late in the day so on my own I split 3x based on some medical information I read as to the effectiveness of prednisone in our system.

I take 20 mg daily,10mg morning(between 4-6 when I wake up)

5mg lunch

5mg supper

I saw the rumi again this week she wouldoprefer 2x but only when I feel I can.

I know when I start dropping it will then be a portion of the afternoon dose.

as Eileen says everyone is different but I now can walk out of bed in the middle of the night and not crawl.